


Tired

by Cade Welentine (cadewelentine)



Category: Falsettos - Lapine/Finn
Genre: F/M, Grocery Shopping, Pre-Canon, Suspicions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-12-07 13:45:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11624781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cadewelentine/pseuds/Cade%20Welentine
Summary: This afternoon, she doesn’t even care. She’s just so exhausted; all she wants to do is finish the shopping and get home.





	Tired

**Author's Note:**

  * For [worrylesswritemore](https://archiveofourown.org/users/worrylesswritemore/gifts).



> I couldn't pick a friggin title for this. Normally I find there's a phrase that pops up a few times that I can use, but not with this one. Oh well.  
> This is a companion fic to "What is Normal?" The ending is roughly the same, but from Trina's point of view--so if you think it looks familiar, that's why. You don't have to have read "What is Normal?" to enjoy this fic, /but/ it does add depth to some parts.
> 
> Enjoy!!

Trina always picks the cart with the squeaky, sticky wheels. Without fail. It doesn’t matter if she tries to memorize the ads that are placed on it, or the imperfections on the plastic of the handle, so she can try to avoid grabbing it next time--the cart she picks is _always_ the squeaky, sticky one.

This afternoon, she doesn’t even care. She’s just so exhausted; all she wants to do is finish the shopping and get home. She started the day by cleaning her and Marvin’s bedroom--changed the sheets, vacuumed the area rug, wiped down the windows with a rag, and reorganized her vanity. It’s crazy how much that took out of her; she hasn’t been so tired after housework since she was pregnant with Jason--and she _knows_ pregnancy can’t be the culprit of this, because Marvin hasn’t touched her in months. She’s just _tired_.

“Jason, honey,” she starts, trying not to sound as weary as she feels. “Will you go pick out a bag of carrots for me?” The nine-year old rolls his eyes, but he does it anyway. Trina tries not to think about the fact that he’s almost ten, and that his attitude problem is only going to get worse from here.

She pulls one of the flimsy plastic produce bags off the roll and shakes it open as she maneuvers around a woman who is taking far too long inspecting cucumbers. She grabs her own cuke and drops it in the bag, twisting it shut and placing in the cart. The grocery store is remarkably crowded for a Wednesday afternoon--or, at least, Trina thinks it is. She normally did the shopping on Mondays (partially because Jason had chess club after school on Mondays, so she could shop alone, and partially because Marvin had Wednesdays off, and she hated to leave him home alone), but Jason had caught a stomach bug Sunday night, and stayed home from school on Monday, leaving Trina too preoccupied to bother with errands.

Half a second later, Jason deposits a bag of carrots down beside the cucumber, and holds out a box of sugary cereal for his mother to inspect. How he came across it on his way to the carrots is beyond her.

“Can we get this?” He asks. “Please?” Trina sighs and takes the box from him, pretending to look it over; she’s going to let him get this one thing in the hopes that it will keep him from asking for anything else. Besides, one box of sugar cereal wasn’t going to be the death of him.

“Alright.” She says with a sigh, dropping it the cart and moving on. Jason looks surprised by this turn of events, but he’s smart enough to know not to question it. Trina’s oddly proud.

***

They make it through the shopping--but barely. Jason pushes his luck and asks for more things at every turn; there is one particularly nasty altercation between the two of them in the frozen food aisle in which Trina threatens to smack Jason ‘so hard’ that his ‘kid’s will be born dizzy’. Other customers stare, wide-eyed and judgmental, and Trina loses her nerve completely, shrinking down into herself and letting Jason drop the box of popsicles in the cart anyway.

Trina loads the bags into the trunk of the station wagon with minimal help from Jason, who buckles himself into the back and puts his Walkman on. He’s effectively tuned his mother out.

Trina gets into the driver’s seat, turns the key in the ignition, and backs out of her parking space. She’s nearly jackknifed by a teenage boy who is too busy laughing with his friends to pay attention to where he’s going. She says a silent prayer of thanks that she saw him in time to pull out of the way; she makes a silent decision not to tell Marvin about it.

The rest of the drive home is uneventful and automatic. Trina doesn’t quite realize they’ve pulled into their assigned parking spot until Jason unclips his seat belt and hops out of the back.

Neither Jason nor Marvin offers her any assistance with taking the bags out of the car. Luckily, there’s few enough that she can carry them all up in one trip. Jason leaves the apartment door open for her--at least, Trina tells herself he did it for her, and that he didn’t just forget to close it again. She deposits the bags on the counter and asks Jason to please start putting groceries away. He does so begrudgingly.

“Marvin?” She calls, already heading toward their bedroom before she hears his response float from its open doorway. He’s sitting on their bed, his pants already in a heap on the floor as his fingers undo the buttons on his shirt. His hair is something of a mess, but it’s always something of a mess, and she finds it oddly charming.

“I’m just getting changed.” He tells her, and she _does_ notice that she didn’t ask. “How was your day?”

“Fine.” Trina says, her fingers deftly removing one pearl stud, then the other, and sets the earrings down on the vanity. “The store was _mobbed_. Jason kept asking for candy, which was a nightmare.” She doesn’t tell him about her (admittedly empty, but very public) threats.

“I can imagine.” Marvin says, but she knows that he can’t. He’s never spent more than thirty minutes alone with Jason; he doesn’t know how truly difficult their son can be--nor how similar the two of them are.

“How about you?” She asks. “What did you do?” She is legitimately curious. Normally, she entertains Marvin on his days off, and she wonders what sorts of things her husband gets up to when he’s left to his own devices.

Marvin just shrugs. “Nothing much. Just waited for you and Jason to be home--like always.”

Trina opens her mouth to scoff at his ‘like always’, because this situation has _never_ happened before, but before she can, a loud “Hey!” wafts in from their open window. She immediately starts for it, but Marvin beats her to the punch, leaning his whole upper body out the window to investigate; Trina couldn’t sneak a peek if she tried.

“That sounded like Mrs. Drachman,” She remarks from her place by the vanity. She can’t help but notice that some things are out of place. Her hairbrush is left carelessly in the middle--she always leaves it off to the left, right next to her hairspray. Her lipstick is laid on its side instead of stood straight up. She wonders just what Marvin’s ‘nothing much’ entailed. “Is she okay?”

“I think so.” Marvin says. “Doesn’t look like anybody’s out there.” He ducks back in and pushes the window shut. For a brief second, Trina considers confronting him, asking him if he _really_ did nothing while she was out, but she doesn’t. She has no real proof of anything (a few misplaced vanity items do not a mistress make), and she’s in no mood to start a fight with him now.

Instead, she asks a different question: “What do you want for dinner?” Because she hasn’t started anything yet, and if he’s going to be pissy about it being later than normal, she might as well give him something he actually wants to eat to offset the irritation.

“I dunno.” He says with another shrug. “Whatever’s easiest.”

 _Chinese take-out it is, then_. Trina thinks, but she doesn’t say it. Marvin won’t find it as funny as she does. Rather, she decides on cooking the steak she just bought, with the carrots and maybe zucchini, because she can just toss it all in the oven and be done with it. She’s just so damn _tired_.

“Okay.” She says with a nod and a forced smile. Marvin smiles back at her, and her own becomes a little less forced.

“I love you.” She says, leaning against the vanity.

Marvin smiles wider. “I know.”


End file.
